Documentary family session, Glasnevin, Dublin

“She makes my heart swell.” said Leanne while looking at Penny asleep in her pram.

Going from a family of three to a family of four is a big change. When you know (or believe) this new baby is going to be your last baby, this is even more special than it already was.

I really enjoyed witnessing a normal day with this family and capturing the little details of what makes them who they are at this point in time and the connections between them. Things change so quickly and their life is so different from what it was last year and what it will be a year from now.

Years from now, when they look at those images, they will remember what it felt like, what their 3-year-old daughter’s voice sounded like and how their 3 months-old used to cover her face with her hand.

Life is messy, colourful, noisy, especially with children. Life is full of perfect imperfections. The beauty is in the ordinary.

This is reality. A reality we should treasure and capture, for us, but even more so for our children. Let’s show them what it was really like when they were small: where we lived, how much we loved them, the little things we used to do, the love, the tears, the fights… it’s all in the details.

As a photographer, while I do take a lot pictures of my girls, I very rarely get my big camera out. The last thing I want after a day working on my clients photographs is sit at the computer to go through personal photos. Which means I have quasi none printed. The biggest thing though was being absent from my photographs, except a few selfies.

Hiring a photographer seemed a little strange, when I could do it all myself. When you offered to come into our home and photograph us on a normal day, I was a little scared. Was our daily life interesting enough for the camera? Was our house tidy enough? I was also 4-months postpartum and didn’t feel my best.

What I loved most about the session was how relaxed it was. After a little while, you just forget about the camera. Discovering the images for the first time was also a big surprise. I didn’t think I would feel this way about them. Seeing myself in the photos wasn’t as hard as I thought, and I loved seeing our family unit from your perspective.

Two years later, we often flick through our album together with the girls. They particularly love the photographs where the 4 of us are together.

It’s time we do it again, and this time, I won’t be worried about picking a time of the day when they go mental :) It’s not about capturing a polished version of ourselves, or only the happy times… I want to capture the feeling of what our life feels like at that moment in time.